COVID-19: World took time to respond to coronavirus crisis, says PM Narendra Modi at G20 Summit

New Delhi: Speaking at the virtual G20 Summit on Thursday (March 26, 2020, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that the world has taken time to respond to the coronavirus crisis even as he has called on a new concept of globalisation which remains fiocussed on the collective well-being of humankind.

“Even 3 months after the crisis, we are trying to find coordinated response,” PM Modi said, adding, “G20 meeting shows international community has come together” but it has “taken some time to respond to the crisis with this magnitude and dimension”.

The PM stressed on the need to “look at the collective interest of all humankind” and “human aspects of our global collective conscious has been subsumed by economic and financial focus”.

Calling COVID crisis “a challenge and an opportunity for the grouping to look at a new concept of globalisation, which looks at humanity and collective interest of all humankind,” the PM noted the “alarming social and economic costs of the pandemic”.

He added that ”90% of the COVID-19 cases and 88% of deaths are from G20 countries.”

India also called for úrgent reform of the World Health Organisation (WHO) at the G20 virtual summit that took place on Thursday evening.

The PM highlighted that international organizations like the WHO need to be strengthened and reformed. ”WHO initially did not have the mandate to deal with the pandemic of this sort, which is why empowering of WHO is necessary be it in terms of its capacity of early warning or development of effective vaccines, or capacity building,” PM Modi said.

New Delhi also called for the need to “freely and openly share” the benefits of medical research and development and “develop adaptive, responsive and humane health care systems”.

India stressed “the fact that leaders met is significant” and the “inspiration for the global collective response to the COVID crisis came from India and PM Modi in particular”

This is for the first time G20 summit took place on issues which are not economic but humanitarian. G20, formed after the 2008 financial crisis, has 20 of the world’s largest economies and contributed 80% of the world’s GDP and 60% of the world population.